The co-founder of social news website Reddit committed suicide in New York City. Aaron Swartz was facing a possible sentence to decades in jail and a $1 million fine over the alleged theft of journal articles with intent to post them online.

“The tragic and heartbreaking information you received is,
regrettably, true,” Swartz’ attorney, Elliot R. Peters, said
in an email to The Tech.

Swartz hanged himself on Friday in his Brooklyn apartment weeks
before he was to go on trial, police reported. His body was found
by his girlfriend, who called the emergency services

The 26-year-old was the co-founder of Reddit and executive
director of Demand Progress, a website that focuses on policy
changes for civil liberties, civil rights, and government reform
in the US. He advocated making information freely available
online and cooperated with Creative Commons, a non-profit
organization aiming to facilitate sharing of creative works.

Swartz was also a renowned programmer. By the age of 13, he
created his first web application which was essentially the same
idea as Wikipedia, according to his website. He contributed to
the creation of the RSS, a popular web feed format used to alert
users about updates of content.

In 2011, Swartz was charged with allegedly stealing more than
four million academic journals from JSTOR, an archive of
scientific journals and academic papers, via an open connection
at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

He faced 13 felony charges, including breaching site terms and
intending to share downloaded files through peer-to-peer
networks, computer fraud, wire fraud, obtaining information from
a protected computer, and criminal forfeiture. He was also
accused of evading MIT’s attempts to kick his laptop off the
network while downloading millions of documents from JSTOR.

Many say the lawsuit is unfounded because MIT allows guests
access to JSTOR – and Swartz, who was undertaking a fellowship at
Harvard’s Safra Center for Ethics at the time of downloading, was
a guest.

The case has also been deemed highly controversial because it
wasn’t JSTOR – the alleged victim in the case – which referred
Swartz to the federal government, according to the company’s vice
president of Marketing and Communications, Heidi McGregor. She
says JSTOR was content once it reclaimed the works from Swartz.

“We stopped this downloading activity, and the individual
responsible, Mr. Swartz, was identified. We secured from Mr.
Swartz the content that was taken, and received confirmation that
the content was not and would not be used, copied, transferred,
or distributed,” the company said in its statement on the
prosecution.

The statement went on to say that the investigation was directed
by the United States Attorney’s Office.

And while the US government was threatening Swartz with decades
in prison and a hefty fine, some say the move was entirely
unfounded.

“This makes no sense. It’s like trying to put someone in jail
for allegedly checking too many books out of the library,”
Demand Progress Executive Director David Segar said in a
statement, as quoted by Wired magazine.

“It’s even more strange because the alleged victim has
settled any claims against Aaron, explained they’ve suffered no
loss or damage, and asked the government not to prosecute,”
Segal said.

His family blamed the United States Attorney's Office for his
death.

"Aaron’s death is not simply a personal tragedy. It is the
product of a criminal justice system rife with intimidation and
prosecutorial overreach. Decisions made by officials in the
Massachusetts US Attorney’s office and at MIT contributed to his
death," they said in a statement released Sunday.

Feeling he had no other choice, Swartz surrendered himself to
authorities in July 2011 and was released on bond. In September
2012, he appeared at the hearing in court and pleaded not guilty.
His trial was scheduled for February 2013.

Many of the charges stemmed from Swartz allegedly breaching
JSTOR’s terms of service agreement.

“JSTOR authorizes users to download a limited number of
journal articles at a time,” the latest indictment said.
“Before being given access to JSTOR’s digital archive, each
user must agree and acknowledge that they cannot download or
export content from JSTOR’s computer servers with automated
programs such as web robots, spiders, and scrapers.”

The case would have tested the reach of the Computer Fraud and
Abuse Act, which was created to reduce the cracking of computer
systems and federal domains-related offenses. The law, which was
passed in 1984, enhances the government’s ability to prosecute
hackers who accessed computers to steal information or disrupt
computer functionality.

But according to plaintiff attorney Max Kennerly, Swartz may not
have violated the law at all.

“It is by no means clear that Swartz has actually violated
the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. Recently, the Fourth Circuit
joined the Ninth Circuit in alleging that violating the terms of
service does not constitute a crime under the CFAA. In contrast,
the Fifth, Seventh and Eleventh Circuits have held that it can be
a crime. Swartz' case is in the First Circuit. This is the
classic sort of Circuit Split that prompts Supreme Court
review,” Kennerly said on his blog.

If he would have been convicted, Swartz would have faced up to 35
years in prison and a $1 million fine.